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This little bit of cultural misappropriation has always bugged me. Oddly enough, it is always the Europeans insisting on these Persian/Iranian matters being "Ar

This little bit of cultural misappropriation has always bugged me. Oddly enough, it is always the Europeans insisting on these Persian/Iranian matters being "Arab". I seriously wonder if this is still nursing ancient Persian Greek/Roman rivalries and is a byproduct of a chauvinist classical education of the European educated set of 19th century. I find it very strange. In the OP, we have a female Persian name (Shahrzad, the story teller) and a male Persian name (Shahryar, the king). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Thousand_and_One_Nights#Persian_prototype:_Hez%C4%81r_Afs%C4%81n https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Thousand_and_One_Nights#Pe... "The earliest mentions of the Nights refer to it as an Arabic translation from a Persian book, Hezār Afsān (aka Afsaneh or Afsana), meaning 'The Thousand Stories'." Hezar means 1000. Afsan means fantasy/story. Now it's true that the modern version is called Hezaar-o yek Shab (Thousand and one nights). So possibly that 'one' story is the Arab contribution. [Filed under the "The Gulf" files]

Mediterraneo10 6y ago
The version of these tales that became internationally famous date from a time after Persia had already been under Arabic and Muslim influence for centuries and the Persian language had become replete with Arabic borrowings. It is the same reason that many of the traditions and foreign words borrowed into the cultures of Central Asia and the Volga–Kama region are generally referred to as "Arabo-Persian", even though those peoples were dealing mainly with Persian speakers and rarely met an actual Arab.
- eternalban 6y ago
  As I said this is a minor item. The major one, which one sees to this day in contemporary European sources (even scholarly matter), is how Arabs translated ancient sources into Arabic. This occulation of (substantial and far reaching) contribution of Iran to "Western civilization" is unique to European sources. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmission_of_the_Greek_Classics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmission_of_the_Greek_Clas... Arab historians themselves, to their lasting credit, had the intellectual integrity: “It is a remarkable fact that, with few exceptions, most Muslim scholars…in the intellectual sciences have been non-Arabs…thus the founders of grammar were Sibawaih and after him, al-Farisi and Az-Zajjaj. All of them were of Persian descent…they invented rules of (Arabic) grammar…great jurists were Persians… only the Persians engaged in the task of preserving knowledge and writing systematic scholarly works. Thus the truth of the statement of the prophet becomes apparent, ‘If learning were suspended in the highest parts of heaven the Persians would attain it”…The intellectual sciences were also the preserve of the Persians, left alone by the Arabs, who did not cultivate them…as was the case with all crafts…This situation continued in the cities as long as the Persians and Persian countries, Iraq, Khorasan and Transoxiana (modern Central Asia), retained their sedentary culture.” - Muqaddimah, by Abū Zayd ‘Abd ar-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad ibn Khaldūn al-Ḥaḍramī, translated by F. Rosenthal (III, pp. 311-15, 271-4 [Arabic]; Frye, R.N. (1977). Golden Age of Persia, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, p.91). Soviet Russian historians are equally factual regarding these matters. As I said, this is a remarkable feature of European version of history as far as Iran is concerned.
  - Mediterraneo10 6y ago
    > Soviet Russian historians are equally factual regarding these matters It is within the Soviet Russian research tradition (after all, most publications on the history of the languages and cultures of Central Asia and the Volga–Kama were produced then, when these regions were within the USSR) that the aforementioned term "Arabo-Persian" is heavily used. Your posts on this matter make you appear to be one of those Persian nationalists who can’t stop banging on about how Persians aren't Arabs. I think many people here are capable of understanding the nuances involved, and it isn't really appropriate for you to continue to claim victimization.
    - eternalban 6y ago
      > Your posts on this matter make you appear to be one of those Persian nationalists who can’t stop banging on about how Persians aren't Arabs. Not correct and borderline ad hom. I am a Muslim and do not care for such ethnic distinctions.
goto11 6y ago
> I seriously wonder if this is still nursing ancient Persian Greek/Roman rivalries and is a byproduct of a chauvinist classical education of the European educated set of 19th century. I find it very strange. You are overthinking this. It is called Arabian Nights (in some translations) because the stories are translated from Arabic. It is like calling the Brothers Grimm fairy tales German, even though some of the stories may have originated somewhere else. The 19 century orientalists were certainly chauvinist by modern standards, but did not in particular elevate Arab culture above Persian culture. Suggesting that Arab culture supplied just one story to the collection makes you the chauvinist. The stories have all kinds of origins - Persian, Indian, Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Syrian, even European.

Mediterraneo10 6y ago

The version of these tales that became internationally famous date from a time after Persia had already been under Arabic and Muslim influence for centuries and the Persian language had become replete with Arabic borrowings. It is the same reason that many of the traditions and foreign words borrowed into the cultures of Central Asia and the Volga–Kama region are generally referred to as "Arabo-Persian", even though those peoples were dealing mainly with Persian speakers and rarely met an actual Arab.

eternalban 6y ago
As I said this is a minor item. The major one, which one sees to this day in contemporary European sources (even scholarly matter), is how Arabs translated ancient sources into Arabic. This occulation of (substantial and far reaching) contribution of Iran to "Western civilization" is unique to European sources. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmission_of_the_Greek_Classics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmission_of_the_Greek_Clas... Arab historians themselves, to their lasting credit, had the intellectual integrity: “It is a remarkable fact that, with few exceptions, most Muslim scholars…in the intellectual sciences have been non-Arabs…thus the founders of grammar were Sibawaih and after him, al-Farisi and Az-Zajjaj. All of them were of Persian descent…they invented rules of (Arabic) grammar…great jurists were Persians… only the Persians engaged in the task of preserving knowledge and writing systematic scholarly works. Thus the truth of the statement of the prophet becomes apparent, ‘If learning were suspended in the highest parts of heaven the Persians would attain it”…The intellectual sciences were also the preserve of the Persians, left alone by the Arabs, who did not cultivate them…as was the case with all crafts…This situation continued in the cities as long as the Persians and Persian countries, Iraq, Khorasan and Transoxiana (modern Central Asia), retained their sedentary culture.” - Muqaddimah, by Abū Zayd ‘Abd ar-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad ibn Khaldūn al-Ḥaḍramī, translated by F. Rosenthal (III, pp. 311-15, 271-4 [Arabic]; Frye, R.N. (1977). Golden Age of Persia, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, p.91). Soviet Russian historians are equally factual regarding these matters. As I said, this is a remarkable feature of European version of history as far as Iran is concerned.
- Mediterraneo10 6y ago
  > Soviet Russian historians are equally factual regarding these matters It is within the Soviet Russian research tradition (after all, most publications on the history of the languages and cultures of Central Asia and the Volga–Kama were produced then, when these regions were within the USSR) that the aforementioned term "Arabo-Persian" is heavily used. Your posts on this matter make you appear to be one of those Persian nationalists who can’t stop banging on about how Persians aren't Arabs. I think many people here are capable of understanding the nuances involved, and it isn't really appropriate for you to continue to claim victimization.
  - eternalban 6y ago
    > Your posts on this matter make you appear to be one of those Persian nationalists who can’t stop banging on about how Persians aren't Arabs. Not correct and borderline ad hom. I am a Muslim and do not care for such ethnic distinctions.

goto11 6y ago

> I seriously wonder if this is still nursing ancient Persian Greek/Roman rivalries and is a byproduct of a chauvinist classical education of the European educated set of 19th century. I find it very strange. You are overthinking this. It is called Arabian Nights (in some translations) because the stories are translated from Arabic. It is like calling the Brothers Grimm fairy tales German, even though some of the stories may have originated somewhere else. The 19 century orientalists were certainly chauvinist by modern standards, but did not in particular elevate Arab culture above Persian culture. Suggesting that Arab culture supplied just one story to the collection makes you the chauvinist. The stories have all kinds of origins - Persian, Indian, Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Syrian, even European.